Coutinho is still far from fulfilling his potential. Will he succeed at Aston Villa?

The next Ronaldo or Messi. Year after year we hear these descriptions about a good number of promising footballers who are predicted to have a bright future. However, few can come close to these predictions, often the football prodigy ends up in the not-so-substantial average. One such player who has come close to his full potential but has failed to make the most of it is Brazilian offensive all-rounder Philippe Coutinho.

Futsal to technical excellence

Little Philippe’s football journey began on a small patch of land near his parents’ home in Sao Paulo, alongside his two older brothers. It was there that his love for the round nonsense was born and his undeniable talent first began to emerge.

Like the vast majority of young Brazilian footballers, he began to improve his skills by playing futsal, which, in his own words, helped him greatly in his technical skills.

After joining a local football club, his father was approached by representatives of the youth team coaches of Vasco da Gama, which plays in the second highest league in the Canary Islands, after a futsal tournament.

It was with the Cruzmaltinos that Coutinho’s dreams of professional football first took shape. He stood out above his peers and regularly represented Brazil in the youth categories.

Moving to Italy

In July 2008, the renowned Inter Milan coveted him and, after an agreement, still kept the 16-year-old magician on a two-year loan at his current place of work. At the age of eighteen, Coutinho moved to Lombardy to prove his football talents on the old continent.

Under the wing of Rafael Benitez, who replaced Jose Mourinho on the Nerazzurri bench, he was to become the future of the blue and black. The undersized chic opened his goal scoring account in style with a precise shot from a direct free kick into the Fiorentina net. All in all, in his first season in Italy, he started twenty competitive games mostly from the bench.

The second season was supposed to be even better for the Brazilian, but also due to a certain fragility linked to his physique and susceptibility to injury, the Milan big club’s directive decided to let Coutinho leave for a six-month loan to Espanyol Barcelona in the winter transfer window.

He managed to play 16 league games for the club from the RCDE Stadium, in which he accumulated 5 goals and one assist.

A breakthrough transfer to Liverpool

After finishing his guest stint at sunny Barcelona, he returned back to the San Siro, but once again failed to break through to regular and, above all, higher figures of minutes. That’s why, after half a year, Inter’s management agreed with English Liverpool on the transfer of the offensive midfielder for 13 million euros.

If any moment in Coutinho’s promising career can be considered a turning point, it is the transfer to the Reds. Liverpool needed just such a creative player in midfield. In his first half-season in England, he hit 13 duels in which he managed to be directly involved in 10 goals (3+7), a dream statistic for a debut six months in the Premier League.

One of the best in the league

With the number ten on his back, he led the entire team with his performances. His vision, passing and the Brazilian’s inherent ability to dribble the ball tightly at his feet drove Premier League defenders more and more crazy with each passing season.

Over time, Coutinho’s star has ranked among the brightest in England and at times he has been Eden Hazard’s greatest rival in winning individual trophies. The glow of his star naturally reached as far as Spain, where Real Madrid and Barcelona were interested in his services.

Dream transfer to Barcelona

It was Barcelona, also through Coutinho’s childhood friend Neymar, who tried to persuade the player to transfer to Camp Nou. But in the summer of 2017, it was Neymar who heard the call of a fabulous payday and the chance to step out of Messi’s shadow and left to perform his footballing magic at PSG for 222 million euros. So it came to pass that Coutinho was supposed to be more of a replacement for compatriot Neymar for Barcelona.

Understandably, the Anfield Road club’s directive was twitching hard and they didn’t want to let their best player go. Even coach Jürgen Klopp spoke to his soul, but even that didn’t work. Although he still steadfastly rejected offers in the summer transfer window, by the January deadline Liverpool had already succumbed and gave the nod to a generous offer from Catalonia for an astronomical €135 million.

Iniesta’s successor?

Typologically, it seemed that a player with Cruyff’s 14 on his jersey would be a natural successor to Ándres Iniesta. And the start to his time at the more famous of Barcelona’s two premier league clubs was very solid indeed. In 22 games he managed to score 9 goals and assist another 8.

The reunion with former teammate Luis Suarez worked and Coutinho successfully turned the heads of defenders in La Liga as well.

But the following season brought injuries, a significant drop in form and the associated very harsh criticism from the fans for the Brazilian. Things began to creak and the Rio de Janeiro native’s individual skills seemed to have been left behind in previous seasons.

Let it be a testament to this that the player for whom Barcelona didn’t hesitate to put nearly 140 million euros on the table in January 2018, was allowed to leave on loan to Bayern Munich a year and a half later.

A year-long visit to Munich

In Germany, the 27-year-old midfielder has thrived on the whole. In the company of Lewandowski, Thiago and co, he proved that he still has something special in him, but his performances were not as consistent as expected.

His share of goals scored was not great either. Even though his final stats at the Allianz Arena are 11 goals 14 assists in 39 games played, not dismal numbers, Coutinho managed to score five goals (3+2) in one game for example, but not a single one in several other games.

However, one of the games that definitely worked out for him, besides the aforementioned five-point game against Werder Bremen, was the one against Barcelona, his parent club. There he managed to score 2 goals and assist one in 15 minutes. He contributed to the 8:2 demolition of the Catalans.

Far from ideal

However, after returning to Camp Nou, he was unable to deliver the performance Barca needed, not least after the departure of Lionel Messi. Even the newly arrived coach Xavi Hernandez couldn’t awaken the old Coutinho in him and in January this year the Blaugranas directive let the Brazilian go on loan again, this time to Steven Gerrard-coached Aston Villa.

In his debut game against Manchester United, he performed brilliantly (1+1), however whether the now twenty-nine-year-old Coutinho can bring out the magic he showed at Anfield remains to be seen.

Source: Transfermarkt, Wyscout